Anthem Review Thread

Deleted member 35071 · Feb 23, 2019

Toxi said:
The Division was pretty damn glitchy on release.

but at least the action was fun.....and it had tons of variety in enemies and the map didn't look the same everywhere u went.

o wait. It wasn't fun to play. Had like 3 enemies that was just crackheads with bats....and the whole game was just one empty city block covered in snow.

Division was terrible at launch. Took them awhile...but it went from bad to alright eventually. I put some time into it recently on gamepass. I think i made it to level 15 maybe idk. Its good enough to jump in and waste 2 hrs. But not good enough for me to care about the sequel. The only interesting part about Div2 for me is the setting of DC seeing as im from here.

at least Anthem is fun to play. Hopefully all the other pieces fall into place. I would think its easier to make a fun game good. Then a boring game fun.

DrKelpo · Feb 23, 2019

I didn't closely follow the game's development and maybe it's too soon to ask... But what the fuck happened here?

Who is to blame for this? The first teaser was shown almost 5 years ago, development time wise that doesn't look bad, right?
Looking at past games like BF5 who obviously needed more time, it's easy to blame EA for rushing an unfinished game out. But I'm sure there's more to it.

Darkstorne · Feb 23, 2019

Skux said:
AC has definitely recovered. Odyssey was the best selling AC since Unity and public consensus has turned around ever since Origins refreshed the series with RPG mechanics.

It's recovering. Best sales since Unity. Still not back to the sales figures the franchise used to enjoy. Consumers aren't quick to forget clusterf***s. At least Anthem isn't as bad as Fallout 76 though =/

Jobbs · Feb 23, 2019

DrKelpo said:
Who is to blame for this?

Bioware. I can't imagine a scenario where EA told them not to include basic common sense functionality or have a structure that's not completely disjointed and bizarre. They also didn't mandate the (IMO) obnoxious characters and dull pointless story. I also can't imagine EA being the reason the mission design is terrible and being the reason things like the tomb mission exist. EA also didn't design the poor AI and boring loot. EA didn't do these things any more than EA made Apex (and Titanfall 2) awesome. The developer develops.

Maybe they mandate MTXy stuff -- It'd be nice if armor wasn't tied to MTX -- but that's not the reason the game sucks.

Maledict · Feb 23, 2019

Tagyhag said:
Well put, but especially this part. I understand that Cerebrus had to become a credible menace but they didn't even TRY to justify how they went from some sort of covert ops to the biggest army in the universe. Just do some shit like "Reapers helped them with resources or indoctrinated millions of humans" or something.

That ALL said, I still enjoyed Mass Effect 3. Especially after the Citadel DLC, that actually helped give me closure.

Anthem has none of that magic that helps me justify its shortcomings.

I mean, that's specifically and exactly what they did?

I dislike the Cerberus element in me3 as much as anyone, but there's the entire mission where you learn the 'project refuge' was fake and everyone going there was being indoctrinated and turned into Cerberus soldiers against their will. It's where Miranda's dad was, and the end point of her storyline. So that's where all the troops were coming from - they were literally indoctrinating millions of people.

oni-link · Feb 23, 2019

Bufbaf said:
Some might say the same thing about Anthem.

Anthem wishes it was as good as ME3

aevanhoe · Feb 23, 2019

Claven said:
And they would be wrong, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

Anthem is a hugely flawed game, but not bad.

Guess it floats my boat. But I must be wrong because you said so :)

Josecitox · Feb 23, 2019

eastcoastkody said:
but at least the action was fun.....and it had tons of variety in enemies and the map didn't look the same everywhere u went.

o wait. It wasn't fun to play. Had like 3 enemies that was just crackheads with bats....and the whole game was just one empty city block covered in snow.

Division was terrible at launch. Took them awhile...but it went from bad to alright eventually. I put some time into it recently on gamepass. I think i made it to level 15 maybe idk. Its good enough to jump in and waste 2 hrs. But not good enough for me to care about the sequel. The only interesting part about Div2 for me is the setting of DC seeing as im from here.

at least Anthem is fun to play. Hopefully all the other pieces fall into place. I would think its easier to make a fun game good. Then a boring game fun.

See, that's a perfect example of "the developer was trying something new", Massive literally never made a game like it, their experience was with RTS games, and 2 franchises that were not created by them, AC Revelations and the multiplayer of Far Cry 3. Everything about The Division was ambitious to them and it was in a way more inclined to fail than be success from the start.

Destiny 1, it didn't had story, it's progression systems were a complete mess, one of those was mind boggling coming from Bungie, the other one understandable since they didn't had the experience with that and clearly failed at it. But the game had flawless gameplay and Bungie DNA printed all over it and that's why people thought it was going to click at some point.

What's Bioware's excuse to basically everything about Anthem in it's current state?

Braag · Feb 23, 2019

Please EA! Let BioWare make one more Dragon Age game before you take it to see the corpses of all the previous studios you have killed.

Kyuuji · Feb 23, 2019

I just can't, I need to see it. Like, this looks like it should be such a cool game yet it's mired in this thick web of poor design decisions, loading screens and bugs.

How have they seemingly managed to consistently miss the mark in almost every aspect of the game?

Deleted member 46948 · Feb 23, 2019

Kyuuji said:
How have they seemingly managed to consistently miss the mark in almost every aspect of the game?

Panic scramble mode, I'd imagine.
They'll eventually calm down a little to fix at least the worst mistakes, but it won't be in the next few days.

Wamb0wneD · Feb 23, 2019

Braag said:
Please EA! Let BioWare make one more Dragon Age game before you take it to see the corpses of all the previous studios you have killed.

Looking at the characters in Anthem and the story in general, I don't even know if I want a new one from them to be honest. Inquisition wasn't a great game either.

Sinder · Feb 23, 2019

Wamb0wneD said:
Looking at the characters in Anthem and the story in general, I don't even know if I want a new one from them to be honest. Inquisition wasn't a great game either.

It's really funny because the writing in Anthem almost across the board is an even more lifeless version of Andromeda, and people thought there's no way you can do worse than Andromeda.

Andromeda had some amount of personality with its characters, but there's nothing in Anthem. It's just a sanded down product that feels like it has absolutely nothing in common with Bioware stuff in the past.

rocket · Feb 23, 2019

I am enjoying the main story more than I thought I would honestly, but I probably play the game a lot differently than most people would as I did and enjoy reading the cortex.

WhovianGamer · Feb 23, 2019

Judging by what I have seen, there are deep systemic issues that are either going to take a long time to fix, or will never be fixed.

The length of the load times is one thing, but there are too many load screens. Will they ever be able to cut that down?

Then there is the teleporting, missing story moments etc stuff. That seems pretty hard to take out.

Things like resolution, performance etc can be sorted gradually, but when the game has to cater for high end PCs and the original Xbox One, it has to be a nightmare as each patch would have to be somewhat custom.

I really don't think they should push ahead with DLC until the game is in a fixed state.

Iucidium · Feb 23, 2019

Lunar15 said:
I've got no skin in the game, but this sounds really similar to Destiny. People seem to like the combat - it's just all the other systems that don't mesh well. If their marketing was enough to bring in at least a moderately devoted audience they can probably ride this out until a big update.

It's kinda hard to tell though. Destiny brought in *a lot* of people early on despite shaky reviews. But the reviews didn't seem this bad.

Destiny had the advantage that it was treading new ground on consoles. Anthem dues not have this luxury.

shimon · Feb 23, 2019

Laughing Banana said:
Seriously, what were they THINKING for that Tomb challenges thing. Why put those kind of things to block your story progression? Couldn't they really think of something else?

First I was thinking that they wanted to roadblock people with 10h trial version so they wouldn't get to far and realize the game never evolves and it's the same shit over and over. But at the same time other people had access to the full game bc of Premier.
So I don't know what the answer is, lack of creativity? Quickly approaching deadlines for creating quests bc they spend more time on something else Frostbite related? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Yu Narukami · Feb 23, 2019

How many people were watching yesterday on twitch? I forgot to check.

Truant · Feb 23, 2019

Iucidium said:
Destiny had the advantage that it was treading new ground on consoles. Anthem dues not have this luxury.

Destiny also came out in 2014. It's like Bioware has been living under a rock.

Ploid 6.0 · Feb 23, 2019

Heartimecia said:
HI y'all
My review at RPG Site is up and I don't imagine it'll do the Metacritic score any favors
https://www.rpgsite.net/review/8297-anthem-review

Looking at the review made me wonder if they slowed the gameplay way down, made moving to each location slow and scenic, with ok basically slow RDR style

BlackManLovesKUF said:
I like and replay Dragon Age 2 over Origins and Inquisition largely on the strength of it's gameplay. Dragon Age 2 probably has one of my favorite combat systems in a WRPG, Origins and Inquisition feel much slower in comparison.

I thought I was crazy or something for thinking this. I love the combat and improved tactical menu programing in DA2. More combos, and the difficulty mods made it even better. Seeing a plan come together and watching the damage float up is so satisfying, I don't even mind the map recycles or waves of enemies. After I finish my current run on Pillars of Eternity 2 I'm reinstalling DA2.

Ada · Feb 23, 2019

During the development of this game you have to wonder if the gameplay designers thought that 3 quest types was too few.

Fliesen · Feb 23, 2019

NucelarGenZ said:
The sword hand is better xD

Joeku · Feb 23, 2019

What's the best way to find collectables for the tomb quest? After a couple hours in free roam, that is the only thing I have left.

Deleted member 44371 · Feb 23, 2019

Ada said:
During the development of this game you have to wonder if the gameplay designers thought that 3 quest types was too few.

I agree. I have never seen such bad mission design and lack of variety. Maybe they only had one mission designer?

tuxfool · Feb 23, 2019

marzoo said:
I agree. I have never seen such bad mission design and lack of variety. Maybe they only had one mission designer?

I'm sure that over the course of a few years, even one mission designer can come up with more than 3.

texhnolyze · Feb 23, 2019

WhovianGamer said:
Judging by what I have seen, there are deep systemic issues that are either going to take a long time to fix, or will never be fixed.

The length of the load times is one thing, but there are too many load screens. Will they ever be able to cut that down?

Then there is the teleporting, missing story moments etc stuff. That seems pretty hard to take out.

Things like resolution, performance etc can be sorted gradually, but when the game has to cater for high end PCs and the original Xbox One, it has to be a nightmare as each patch would have to be somewhat custom.

I really don't think they should push ahead with DLC until the game is in a fixed state.

Yeah, some stuff are just not fixable. They need to rework the game from the ground up to get rid of the loading screens, totally different from reducing loading times. It could work if they manage to reduce the loading times to 5-10 seconds at most, but that's just impossible.

norwegiandude86 · Feb 23, 2019

texhnolyze said:
Yeah, some stuff are just not fixable. They need to rework the game from the ground up to get rid of the loading screens, totally different from reducing loading times. It could work if they manage to reduce the loading times to 5-10 seconds at most, but that's just impossible.

Isn't the big problem with all of this the frostbite engine itself I have seen so many developers talk about how difficult the frostbite engine is to develop in.

Bioware said just creating an inventory system in Inquisition was a nightmare in frosbite and making a game is hard enough without the tools working against you.

Lyng · Feb 23, 2019

tuxfool said:
I'm sure that over the course of a few years, even one mission designer can come up with more than 3.

I am not so sure. Bungie haven't even managed to really increase variety above. Activate/protect thing whole bunch of little dudes attack and in the end big dude, so I don't have faith in BioWare doing it either.

Zem · Feb 23, 2019

Ada said:
During the development of this game you have to wonder if the gameplay designers thought that 3 quest types was too few.

1. Collect the orbs and bring them back to the thing
2. Stand in a circle and kill waves of enemies

But what's the third?

Deleted member 46948 · Feb 23, 2019

Zem said:
1. Collect the orbs and bring them back to the thing
2. Stand in a circle and kill waves of enemies

But what's the third?

Just kill some dudes until they stop spawning.

mescalineeyes · Feb 23, 2019

Zem said:
1. Collect the orbs and bring them back to the thing
2. Stand in a circle and kill waves of enemies

But what's the third?

collect fragments that kill your flying ability and bring them back to the thing.

Zem · Feb 23, 2019

ah yes, the most annoying of them all

Deleted member 29249 · Feb 23, 2019

The amount or speed of the loading screens don't don't bother me as a destiny fan, if they let you do something during them then it would be better (check the lore stuff look as missions ect..).

The teleporting thing must be a bigger issue on pc with all the diffrent hard drive out there, on Xbox I've only run into it 2 times so far, once when I was gathering stuff instead of following the path and another when I joined an ongoing mission. Again it's something as a destiny player I can live with, you get people running through strikes not killing anything just to hit these check points then die and force everyone to that check point, or you get people just not doing anything and just getting booted to next group section as well. Best fix for this would just be faster loads.

Also I would like the default spawn in location to be the javelin dock, speed thing up in the fort a bit.

Tomeru · Feb 23, 2019

Lyng said:
I am not so sure. Bungie haven't even managed to really increase variety above. Activate/protect thing whole bunch of little dudes attack and in the end big dude, so I don't have faith in BioWare doing it either.

Lol what? Are you serious? You can't be serious. Please say you were joking. Veriaty is not one of Destinys problems. Unless you have issues with shooting incorperated into everything. Which is a wierd issue to have honestly.

Deleted member 888 · Feb 23, 2019

Sinder said:
It's really funny because the writing in Anthem almost across the board is an even more lifeless version of Andromeda, and people thought there's no way you can do worse than Andromeda.

Andromeda had some amount of personality with its characters, but there's nothing in Anthem. It's just a sanded down product that feels like it has absolutely nothing in common with Bioware stuff in the past.

Haven't like all the notable writers and project leads since ME1/2 and even 3 left? Seems like Bioware hasn't reinvested in good writers.

Lyng · Feb 23, 2019

Tomeru said:
Lol what? Are you serious? You can't be serious. Please say you were joking. Veriaty is not one of Destinys problems. Unless you have issues with shooting incorperated into everything. Which is a wierd issue to have honestly.

The mission, lost sector and strike design all boil down to shoot x amount of little dudes and activate thing. Shoot big guy. Loot chest....done
Where Destiny shines is in its raids and gameplay. The mission design is really lacking in variety.
It's not as bad as Anthem but that's saying nothing.

tuxfool · Feb 23, 2019

Lyng said:
I am not so sure. Bungie haven't even managed to really increase variety above. Activate/protect thing whole bunch of little dudes attack and in the end big dude, so I don't have faith in BioWare doing it either.

I wouldn't say that failing is unique to BioWare. Insipid mission design seems to be endemic to the whole genre.

Tomeru · Feb 23, 2019

Lyng said:
The mission, lost sector and strike design all boil down to shoot x amount of little dudes and activate thing. Shoot big guy. Loot chest....done
Where Destiny shines is in its raids and gameplay. The mission design is really lacking in variety.
It's not as bad as Anthem but that's saying nothing.

Way to dumb down just about any shooter ever. Good job!

SmartWaffles · Feb 23, 2019

Lyng said:
The mission, lost sector and strike design all boil down to shoot x amount of little dudes and activate thing. Shoot big guy. Loot chest....done
Where Destiny shines is in its raids and gameplay. The mission design is really lacking in variety.
It's not as bad as Anthem but that's saying nothing.

Destiny 2 has a lot of strikes with unique mechanics, especially in Forsaken with strikes like The Corrupted and Warden of Nothing.

Deleted member 5596 · Feb 23, 2019

Destiny campaign design is basically activate things and shoot waves of dudes...the fuck I'm reading?

ClarkusDarkus · Feb 23, 2019

Nymir said:
Beginning on Earth is really terrible
Space exploration on the map is even worse than ME2
Most sidequests on the Citadel are basically fetch quests
Very linear in comparison to ME1 and ME2
Kei Leng, and to a smaller degree Cerberus as a whole
Multiplayer maps used to increase length in single player campaign
The "war assets" mechanic reduces most of your choices to a number
Javik is DLC
All the manipulative scenes with the child
Turret sections

I could go on, I think it's kind of reductive to say that every problem ME3 has can be traced to the ending. You can really see they had to cut corners a lot, for the scope of the project they needed more time.

I think it's still a good game overall. Just not on the same level of 1 and 2 personally.

Harbinger just flying away..
1 hub with 5 floors( citadel )
Telling us to buy dlc at the end of the trilogy!
Cameo roles for ME2 characters when they could easily have joined
Journal was bugged and you always had to scroll up
Couldn't even import your previous characters build so had to create a new face
IGN woman in the game whilst they killed off Emily wong on twitter

In no way shape or form was ME3 great before the ending masked what was a mediocre game.

Makes me wonder how they went from the awesome LOTSB dlc to ME3.

Lyng · Feb 23, 2019

SmartWaffles said:
Destiny 2 has a lot of strikes with unique mechanics, especially in Forsaken with strikes like The Corrupted and Warden of Nothing.

And that's two out of how many? And some of the best are exclusive to one platform.

Corporal · Feb 23, 2019

To whom it may concern: Videogamedunkey also uploaded an Anthem video... of sorts.

...I think?

Does this count as commentary on Anthem specifically given the timing and the SEO-friendly title, or is it about shooters in general.

Eh whatever. It's not like we're talking about god knows what in this thread anyway.

Lyng · Feb 23, 2019

tuxfool said:
I wouldn't say that failing is unique to BioWare. Insipid mission design seems to be endemic to the whole genre.

That is absolutely true

SneakersSO · Feb 23, 2019

Lyng said:
The mission, lost sector and strike design all boil down to shoot x amount of little dudes and activate thing. Shoot big guy. Loot chest....done
Where Destiny shines is in its raids and gameplay. The mission design is really lacking in variety.
It's not as bad as Anthem but that's saying nothing.

Yeah, Destiny 2 Forsaken disproves that entirely. The quest objectives in a variety of ways is far denser & complex than anything on offer here.

Deleted member 5596 · Feb 23, 2019

SmartWaffles said:
Destiny 2 has a lot of strikes with unique mechanics, especially in Forsaken with strikes like The Corrupted and Warden of Nothing.

SneakersSO said:
Yeah, Destiny 2 Forsaken disproves that entirely. The quest objectives in a variety of ways is far denser & complex than anything on offer here.

Are you comparing content of a service game 2 years down the road with one just got released. How many unique strikes were on Vanilla Destiny 2?

Lyng · Feb 23, 2019

The Foarsaken campaign is excellent. I am talking about end game missions. I should have clarified

Phabh · Feb 23, 2019

6/10 from Gamekult. Unsurprising.

https://www.gamekult.com/jeux/anthem-3050876009/test.html

Kyuuji · Feb 23, 2019

Relaxed Muscle said:
Are you comparing content of a service game 2 years down the road with one just got released. How many unique strikes were on Vanilla Destiny 2?

You typically compare new releases to current offerings in the genre. Anthem launch is competing with Destiny at its peak, not its launch.

SneakersSO · Feb 23, 2019

Relaxed Muscle said:
Are you comparing content of a service game 2 years down the road with one just got released. How many unique strikes were on Vanilla Destiny 2?

I'm comparing the content of a service game that was developed over 6 years while competition was on the market, creating expectations of both breadth and depth of content, design, & technical stability for such games.

Anthem doesn't get a pass because it hasn't been on the market long - its launching in 2019. There should, without question, be far more here than there is. Heck, just on the notion that this game is lacking in fundamental modes which would typically eat up resources which other games do have and this doesn't, makes the appalling lack of content here even more perplexing.

Anthem isn't releasing in a vacuum in 2015. Its releasing in 2019, with even fewer supported modes than any other Looter-Shooter out there. There is no excusing how little content there is for the few modes it does have. This game has far, far less content than even Destiny 1 at launch had.

And to answer your question, D2 launch had around 5-6 unique strikes, none of which were repurposed story mission like 2 of the strike equivalents in Anthem are. It also had tons of other modes available, and 4 unique biomes for players to play in, whereas this only has 1.

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